Numbers at Golden Nugget, LVH provide opportunity for profit

Middling is sports-betting strategy whereby we find two different point spreads on the same game, and then lay the smaller number with the favorite and take the bigger number with the underdog. The most we can lose is 5 percent of our combined risk from the two wagers (the 10 percent vig on our losing bet), and if the favorite’s actual margin of victory lands between the two numbers, we win both of our bets (there’s also the possibility, of course, of winning one bet and pushing on the other).

We need to hit just one of 20 attempts to make a profit with this strategy.

Not all middles are created equal. If one book has a favorite laying 2 points and another has the team -4, we have a better chance of middling that game than if we’re trying to middle the favorite -4 and the dog +6 (the most common margin of victory in football is 3, while games rarely land on 5).

The college football games of the year lines posted at the Golden Nugget and LVH SuperBook present plenty of opportunity for middle players, none bigger than the window in the Nov. 13 Cal-USC game – the Nugget lists the Trojans as 34-point favorites, while the LVH’s line is -24.

Here’s a list of games with at least a 2-point line difference between the two books as of this week.